Ketone: Rachel and the Hearts of Darkness

By Emily Barratt

Set in two worlds. One world is a world you know today, full of tehcnology, separated into seven different continents.
The other world is much less modern, a world of Spirit, Fire, Water, Wind, Earth and the Centre, a world of witchcraft and magic.
A Tailed Beast, Witches and Humans. The tailed beast known as the Ketone was a ten tailed monster, created by witchcraft and magic. The ten tails held the power of nine other animals and combined made a perfect weapon until the sealing spell of the witches was discovered and made humans immortal.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Singapore
• Release date: Oct 24, 2012
• ISBN: 9781466928176

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© Copyright 2012 Emily Barratt.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the written prior permission of the author.

ISBN: 978-1-4669-2815-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-2816-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4669-2817-6 (e)

Trafford rev. 09/27/2012

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Contents

Part 1

Rachel and Hearts

of Darkness

Prologue   Over One Thousand Years Ago…

-1-   The Jonas Club

-2-   St. Anthony the Abbot Catholic High School

-3-   Knock at the Window

-4-   Dreams

-5-   The Violin Song

-6-   Secrets and Truths

-7-   True Identities

-8-   The Boy’s Strange Past

-9-   Awakening

-10-   Holding Strange Gazes

-11-   Lips Touch

Part 2

Samuel and Hearts

of Fire

-12-   Visits and Visions

-13-   Invading Thoughts

-14-   Breaking Out

-15-   Curry and Rice, Mmmm!

-16-   Martial Arts, Meditating, and Flying

-17-   The Ketona of Death

-18-   Margaret’s End

Part 3

Blake and Hearts

of Light

-19-   New Fathers, Tricky Meetings

-20-   Running Races

-21-   Black Mist, Blue Mist, Red Mist

-22-   Hated Monster…

-23-   Loved Monster…

PART 1

Rachel and Hearts

of Darkness

PROLOGUE

Over One Thousand Years Ago…

There used to be peace—peace and harmony in both worlds. One world is the world you know today, full of technology, separated into seven different continents (this is counting your Antarctica). Pollution is beginning to rule, and people are well-educated. Tall buildings rule the sky, and large flying aircrafts are an amazing and quick way of transportation.

The other world was much less techno. They don’t have the big, fancy flat-screen TVs, just the small boxes. Houses are made of young wood, which have been grown for buildings. It is divided into six main countries—the countries of Spirit, Fire, Water, Wind, Earth, and the Centre. The Centre is the control centre of this world, where a large city rules. The Dark Times began in this city.

It began with a ten-tailed monster created by witchcraft and magic. The witches were awed by the creature’s power. Its ten tails held the power of nine other animals—a lizard at the irst tail; a phoenix at the second tail; an owl at the third; a lemur at the fourth; the furious power of the ox at the fifth; the dark heart of the wolf sat at the sixth; at the seventh tail sat the eagle; the self-centred but kind cat at the eighth; and finally, the cunning but honest fox at the ninth. These combined powers made the perfect weapon.

But the ten tails had other ideas. With his natural horrid nature, he distributed his powers into nine different animals, those same animals that had given the ten tails power for hundreds of years. Each of the animals had their own set of tails depending on where they sat. The cunning fox was the strongest, with nine tails. The lizard was the weakest, with just one tail.

They became known as the Ketone, the Tailed Beasts. They had dragon cousins too, known as the Ketona. The witches created the dragons; they had turned themselves into the Ketona. This war between them lasted for many years until a simple human found the old lair of the witches, where the Sealing Spell was kept. It hadn’t occurred to the witches that they could seal the Tailed Beasts away in human babies. This human was a young woman, pregnant with her own child.

She studied for many weeks, trying to perfect this spell. As the war raged further, she finally perfected it and entered the war.

The spell was a rhyme. This spell was later named the Ketone Lullaby. Her words that spread over the world, sending shudders through the Ketone, began to soothe them.

‘Feel hatred disappear,

Hold the souls of Ketone trapped in jars,

Let their name bring fear,

Hidden far away,

Keep them well clear,

Of the Ketone Blade . . .

Feel your eyes grow tired,

Let your body grow warm and fall to sleep,

Once you desired

To gain power,

But now you required

The Ketone Lullaby.’

The Ketone, soothed by her song, began to fall asleep, first the lizard and going in order. After they fell asleep, for what seemed to be forever, the woman named herself the Spirit Teller, the person who sang the Ketone to sleep. As her child began to stir in her belly, the Spirit Teller began to create spells to make herself immortal. She didn’t know the cost of becoming immortal was something precious to her. This was, in fact, her unborn child. When the child died the day he was born, the Spirit Teller vowed she would get revenge on the spells she had become so obsessed with.

The Spirit Teller lived through the years, growing stronger, keeping the souls of the Ketone inside small jars. She created a Portal to travel to the other world, where she trapped the souls of the sleeping Ketone into several different babies, all born in different times. The lizard was entrapped into a baby in the Medieval Times. It continued like that—the eagle in the 1800s, the ox in the 1860s. Three of the Ketone, the phoenix, the wolf, and the fox, were all born in the same time, but none of them knew each other. The wolf was entrapped into a young girl. And this is where our story begins, with the beginning of Rachel.

-1-

The Jonas Club

Rachel began to scratch an irritating spot on her left arm. It had a greenish line going above it, and at her palm, there sat a spiral sort of pattern. She stared at it for a moment before the car pulled up to her house. Actually, it was her new house. Rachel never thought that she would move for the fifth time, but maybe it was for the best. She had punched that kid in the nose three weeks ago. But he had deserved it.

Rachel got out and began to look at the dull house. It had a basement at the back left side, a dead tree at the front, weeds neatly placed all over the front lawn. Paint was peeling from the boards. Since Rachel’s mum was unable to afford anything bigger, they were stuck in this ancient house until further notice. It was hard enough with the move, but it was even harder for Rachel’s mother, Linda. Linda was blonde with pretty brown eyes. She was tall, with a lean body.

Rachel was like that too. The only difference was Rachel had long black hair, which went to her thighs, and crimson red eyes. She’d never worn contacts in her life, yet her eyes had the colour of blood and burnt with hatred. She was tall, like her mother, with nice curves. Rachel’s face was kind of like the picture of beauty. Her lips were almost perfect, had it not been for the tiny scar on the left side. She’d accidentally split her lip playing on the swings. She’d attempted to backflip off of the swing when her foot got caught on the back of the seat, and she’d been flung off. She split her lip when she hit the ground.

Rachel stared up at the house—the dull grey roof, pale white panelling with the paint fading and peeling, and dirty windows. Dark grey clouds hung loose in the sky. The letter box was in shambles. A small gravestone sat near the largest patch of weeds.

‘Maybe someone died because the house was so flipping dull,’ Rachel chuckled as she spoke to her mother. ‘I mean, come on, Mum. A dump like this should have been renovated or even torn down.’

‘Rachel, you know exactly why we moved here. I don’t want to hear another word of your complaining. Just shove those earphones into your ears and be done with it. We’re here until further notice, remember?’

‘I remember. Stuck here until… .’

‘You promised, Rachel. Get your suitcase and a box. Choose whichever room you want.’

‘The basement.’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

‘Have you any idea what could be down there? Rats, bugs, spiders, dirt, and…’

‘Dead bodies,’ Rachel added before Linda could go on any further.

‘Excuse me?’

‘In a house this old, I wouldn’t be surprised.’

Linda slapped Rachel’s head lightly. ‘Get your things. Get inside, and please don’t go into the basement, OK? Not until I get that place checked out by a plumber or something.’

‘Sure.’ Rachel grabbed her iPod and shoved it into her ears, booming the music loudly. She hummed the songs quietly and picked up her suitcase and a box of her things. Most of this had a bunch of her small photo albums, one of the few things that had been brought up North from down South. To Rachel, this meant they were here for a long time.

Rachel chose the room with the biggest window. The bed was double-queen-sized with nice green blankets and a bedside table. The curtains were in tatters with moths crawling through them. Rachel decided she was going to replace them. She put a small photo of her, Linda, and her dead father on the bedside table. She stared at her dad’s kind face for a moment before she turned away and opened her suitcase. Rachel rummaged through it for a moment before taking out a nice yellow and pink scarf, a pair of mittens, and a raincoat with boots. She hung the coat on the doorknob and put her boots at the corner of the room. She smiled for a moment before taking out the rest of her things and putting them wherever she wanted.

Rachel looked around her room for a short moment before nodding. ‘All I need to get rid of is the curtains. Then I’m happy. Oh, wait.’

Rachel looked into the box and pulled out another photo. This one was a picture of her ex-boyfriend and her old friends, the people Rachel thought were her friends.

That was the boy she’d punched—her ex-boyfriend. He had been cheating on her, going out with one of the stupid girls Rachel thought was her friend. When Rachel found out, the first thing she did was punch him and get suspended forever. As in, she got expelled.

So it meant she couldn’t get into the university as easily as Linda had planned. Rachel hadn’t planned on going to university in the first place, but oh well.

Rachel decided to explore the house while her mother was unpacking the rest of the house. There was a small balcony near Rachel’s room, two bathrooms, more dull than interesting windows, and a plain bathroom in which the shower didn’t work properly and bugs were crawling along the walls.

Ew.

Rachel walked out to the backyard. It had plants, which was good. The only problem was they were dead. Rachel and her mother were going to get busy before school started. That was in a week.

Rachel sighed as she stared at the dead roses. The roses, which Rachel guessed used to be white, red, blue, and yellow, had turned an ugly brown. The leaves surrounding them were just as ugly and brown. The grass was browner with dirt than green with grass. Rain had begun to drizzle lightly around Rachel as she walked back into the house.

Rachel spent most of her time wandering around town on her bike. Luckily, the removalists came a few hours earlier. It was about six at night. Rachel knew she had to be back around ten, but right now, that didn’t really matter.

Rachel was in Central Square. The town was called Jonas (Rachel used to think it was named after the Jonas Brothers). It was a small town with a lot to offer. At least, that’s what is said when you got to the town sign thingy. The soft sound of bongo drums was playing in the distance, and the sound of singing was echoing too. Rachel chained her bike and began to follow it.

The bongo drums grew louder with every step Rachel took until she could hear the sound of a boy singing. Another boy was singing too. The shouts of other people went on around them.

Rachel opened a door at the back of a large alley and walked down the stairs. The music was booming now, almost like it was calling Rachel to dance. Rachel smiled and opened another door at the end of a hallway. Purple, red, green, pink, and all other colours were beaming from the lights. Rachel opened the door and smiled some more. Around her, people were dancing, laughing, and drinking… juice. So they weren’t illegal. That was good too, and that way, Rachel could tell her mum, and she’d be OK with it.

Maybe.

Two boys were dancing and singing on stage. Rachel immediately recognised the dance as hip hop. Rachel wandered through the crowd and caught notice of two hip-hoppers who looked like partner dancers.

Bongo drums boomed all around Rachel when the singing started again. Her head whipped back to the stage. The boy on the stage was very cute. His hair was black, longish. It bounced around his face as he danced. His eyes were dreamy green. His skin was tan, despite how cold and dark it was around Jonas. The boy next to him was much less cute. He was tall, but he was the shape of a twig. He was the one rapping. The other boy was plain singing.

They both sounded amazing.

Then the music cut off abruptly. Had they finished already? Rachel’s heart had suddenly stopped thudding like the bongo drums.

‘It seems…’ the black-haired boy’s voice was smooth, like velvet. ‘Someone new found the Jonas Club.’

Rachel felt eyes snap to her. A few people started whispering, muttering. The skinny boy jumped down from the stage. He was Asian. At first, Rachel thought he was going